The earth's water supply has many uses. Potable water is necessary for human consumption and food preparation. Water is also important for agricultural purposes, such as for the irrigation of crops and raising livestock, as well as for industrial purposes.
Cooling water systems are often used, for example, in power plants, petroleum refineries, petrochemical plants, natural gas processing plants, food processing plants, semi-conductor manufacturing facilities, and other industrial facilities as a way to regulate equipment and/or process temperatures, such as in condensers of distillation columns, for cooling liquid in crystallization, etc. In removing heat, however, the water itself becomes hot and cannot be safely reintroduced into the environment or put back into the cooling system without the excess heat being removed.
As a result, industrial cooling towers can be used to remove such heat from the circulating cooling water (or other cooling fluid). Certain contaminants found in water may, however, create deposits in piping and/or on portions of expensive equipment and decrease equipment efficiency and/or cause premature failure of the equipment. Moreover, cooling towers can vary in size depending on the amount of fluid that needs to be cooled, the amount of heat that is to be removed, the flow rate of the fluid, etc.
Accordingly, there is a need for facilitating and improving the purification of fluids such as water in different types of industrial and other facilities for both new and existing systems in a simple, practical, and cost-efficient manner.